


Death is Irrelevant; You Might As Well Live

by bellatemple



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Season/Series 10, Demon!Dean, Dramedy, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-25
Updated: 2014-10-25
Packaged: 2018-02-22 12:27:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2507816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellatemple/pseuds/bellatemple
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The immediate aftermath of 9x23 and beyond. Sam and Dean both have to deal with what Dean's become. They're not very good at it, yet.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Death is Irrelevant; You Might As Well Live

**Author's Note:**

> Written for amber1960 and the spn_summergen challenge. Who doesn't love to mix the Borg and Dorothy Parker? asked for demon!Dean, either cracky or angsty; I ended up somewhere between the two. With thanks to my alpha/beta reader, who is the greatest and knows who she is.

Sam cried himself to sleep the night after Dean died. 

The first time it happened, that Wednesday that wasn't, Sam did the same. He loaded Dean's body into the backseat of the Impala, drove out of Florida as fast as he could go — and it was a lucky thing he somehow dodged all the cops, what with the shooting victim in the backseat — and didn't stop until northern Alabama, where he finally found a clearing for the pyre. He spent that night in the Impala, unable to face finding motel room for one, and after sobbing into the upholstery for an hour, finally drifted off, the hope of waking to "Heat of the Moment" lurking in the back of all his dreams. 

The second time, in Indiana, he didn't shed a single tear. He also didn't sleep for days. 

The third time, when Dean vanished and Crowley gloated and Sam's brain shut down and filled in "Dean's dead" because any other option was too strange and terrible to bear, Sam went quiet. He just detached — from Dean, from demons, from life itself until he hit that dog and ran full force into Amelia. He figured, by then, that his body had run out of tears to cry. 

But this time. With Dean saying "I'm proud of us" and collapsing in his arms. With Crowley refusing to answer Sam's call and the bunker looming around him _so big_ and so goddamn empty without Dean to fill it. 

This time there were no sobs, but there were tears. A constant stream rolling down his face. There was nothing to do, no one to guide him. Crowley _would not dare_ to show his face to Sam again and Cas was off doing who knew what to or with the angels. 

Sam didn't even know if Dean could get into Heaven, or if his soul would be trapped in that warehouse or here in the bunker the way Kevin was.

Hell wasn't even an option on the table, as far as Sam was concerned. 

When he woke again, his cheeks weren't even dry. Dean stood over him, skin pale gray in the light from the hallway, and Sam wasn't sure if he was dreaming or if Dean's spirit was already here, practiced and powerful after a life full of death. 

Then Dean grinned and tossed Crowley's severed head onto Sam's nightstand and Sam didn't know whether to be relieved or terrified. 

"Hey little brother." Dean offered Sam a bloody hand. His head tilted left, out of the shadows, and Sam got an eyeful of Dean's pitch black eyes. "Let's go raise some hell." 

Sam's first response was to stare blankly at Dean and wonder if he was having a nightmare. The overwhelming scent of blood convinced him otherwise. 

Dean watched with an expression of mild amusement as Sam leaped out of bed with a litany of variations upon the theme of "Jesus _fuck_ " on his lips. Sam snatched up Crowley's head, then juggled it awkwardly from hand to hand as he realized it was still warm. He stormed out of the rom, Dean hot on his heels, and headed for the bunker's boiler room and the massive furnace that until now Sam had refused to use as a crematorium. He heaved the head into the fire, slammed the heavy gate, and spun on Dean. 

"What the _hell_ , Dean?!" 

Dean shrugged and tilted his head. "He was bothering me." 

"You were _dead_." 

"So what else is new?" Dean clapped his hand cheerfully on Sam's shoulder, leaving a bloody smear on the sleeve of his t-shirt. "Come on, man, let's go back upstairs. I could use a beer." 

Sam didn't want a beer, but he also didn't want to let his brother — his fucking _demon_ brother — out of his sight. This backfired when two bottles in Dean was still going strong and Sam was fidgeting uncomfortably in his seat. Dean smirked, the expression extra strange with his solid black eyes and the blue-gray cast to his skin. 

"Dude. I haven't seen your 'I have to pee' dance in years." 

"I'll be right back," Sam said. " _Do not_ go anywhere." He stood up, briefly considered sketching a devil's trap around Dean where he sat, then gave it up and bolted. He was washing his hands in the sink when the pounding started on the front door. 

He walked slowly into the war room, his feet dragging as he dreaded what he might find. Today had done enough damage. Heaven and/or Hell literally beating down his door would be the perfect cherry to top it off with. 

Instead, he found Dean, throwing himself bodily against the door. "Stupid," he said, letting out a word with every slam. "Goddamn. Piece of. Shit. Fucking. _Open._ "

Sam took his time on the stairs, not trusting that this Dean wouldn't turn on him the moment he got to the top. "Uh," he said. "Dean?" 

"Fucking door's stuck, Sammy," Dean said, and were it not for the fact that he still looked like a fucking corpse, Sam would almost find his petulance cute. 

"I thought I told you not to go anywhere." 

"You're not the boss of me." Dean kicked the door hard enough to dent the metal, apparently unconcerned with the way his new strength was damaging their home. 

Or maybe not really aware. 

Dean huffed and pressed his bloody hands into his hair. Sam winced, remembering how long it had taken to sponge all the blood off his brother's body earlier. At least this time, it wasn't actually _Dean's blood_. "The door's warded," Sam said carefully, coming up behind him. "Pretty fucking heavily." 

Dean rolled his shoulders in a move that could almost be considered a shrug, still glaring at the door. "So?" 

Holy shit. He really didn't know. 

Sam grabbed his arm and yanked. If Dean had been aware of his strength, he could have stood his ground, held Sam off, but instead he followed along, down the stairs and back down the hall to the bathroom. "Sammy?" he said. "Dude, what the hell?" 

Sam didn't answer, just shoved Dean in front of the bank of mirrors. Dean kept looking at him, baffled, until Sam jerked his head at the mirrors. "You were _dead_ , Dean." 

"Yeah, I kinda noticed. You don't really forget how that feels, you know." Dean rolled his eyes — or rolled his head, anyway, Sam couldn't actually see his irises — and finally looked at the mirror. Sam waited. 

Dean stared. Sam waited more. 

Dean leaned in, pressing his fingers into his cheek and pulling his eyelid further open, as though checking to see if the black really did run the whole width and length of his eye. He straightened, turning his head left and right, then pulled up his undershirt and looked at the hole that still ran through his chest. 

Sam turned his head away when Dean started poking at, and then _into_ the hole. 

". . . Huh."

"Huh?" Sam repeated, spinning back — and flinching when he saw just how much of Dean's hand he could fit into the _goddamn hole in his chest_. " _Really?_ You're a fucking _demon_ , Dean!" 

"What?" Dean pulled his hand back out of the hole — thank god — and dropped his shirt. "It's not like it's obvious. I wasn't a demon the _last_ several times I came back from the dead." 

"The first thing you did this time was cut off Crowley's head and leave it for me like a present." 

"He was there." 

" _I wanted to kill him!_ " Sam said, stomping his foot. Dean's lip curled up and Sam dropped his head into his hands. Great. Even as a demon, Dean still managed to make him feel like he was five years old. 

"His body's still in my room," Dean offered. "You could stab it for awhile, if it makes you feel better." 

Sam leaned back against the wall, defeated. "Stop being so fucking cheerful," he said. "It's creepy." 

Dean grinned.

*

Sam shut the book he'd been looking through with a thump. Dean looked up from the old hand mirror he'd found in the linen closet.

"You found something?" 

"I'm an idiot," Sam said. He pushed back from the library table and started pacing. Dean's head twisted back towards the mirror by degrees. Sam made the decision to pretend he was still listening. "I just have to cure you." 

Dean looked up at that, black eyes wide. "Wait, what?" 

"The demon cure. It was working on Crowley and it wasn't really that hard. I could totally use it on you." 

"Dude." Dean set the mirror down carefully, then placed both hands on the table and gently stood up. He'd started doing everything that way about half an hour ago, when he'd casually kicked his feet up and managed to knock the back off one of the chairs. "Curing Crowley almost _killed_ you." 

Sam frowned. "I'm all healed up, now. I'll be fine." 

"You're not going to be fine, Sam, you're going to be _meat_." He tilted his head, a little smirk crossing his face. "I mean, technically you already _are_ meat, but you'd be, you know, less interesting meat." 

Sam stared at him a long moment. It was so easy, even with the eyes, even his mottled skin, to forget that Dean wasn't really _Dean_ , any more. Right up until he decided to describe a person as "interesting meat". 

"Hang on," he said. "You don't want me completing the trials!" 

Dean looked away. "I don't want you to die." 

"Curing you might mean finishing the last trial." Sam shook his finger at him. "Closing Hell for good." 

"Yes, Sam, I'm familiar with the concept." 

"You don't want me to finish," Sam said again. "You _like_ Hell!" 

Dean crossed his arms. "I may be starting to get the appeal." 

"It's _Hell_ , Dean." 

"It's cozy." 

"It's _on fire_." 

"Fires are cozy." Dean smiled, and though it was hard to tell with those eyes, Sam thought maybe his expression went a little distant. "All curled up in front of it on a nice skin rug." 

Sam got the feeling he wasn't talking about bear skin. 

"Yeah, I'm definitely going to have to cure you." 

Dean scowled. "Are not." 

"Am too." 

"Come on, Sam!" Dean threw his arms open. "You like demons! Remember Ruby?" 

Sam flinched. "Really not helping your case." 

"Okay, fine, bad example," Dean said. "Meg. She was totally cool there, at the end." 

"You mean after the part where she tried to kill us over and over again and used my body to shoot and torture you?" 

Dean shrugged. "Obviously." 

Sam shook his head. "I can't deal with this right now." He looked at the line of empty bottles that had grown along each of the shelves in the room. "I need a drink." 

He heard Dean huff behind him as he left. "Weenie."

*

When Sam came back with a six pack and a fifth of whiskey, Dean was back to staring into the mirror again, his mouth pursed in concentration, his eyes narrowed, eyebrows waggling.

"Now you look like you have to pee," Sam said. "Or possibly like you're trying to come on to yourself." 

Dean huffed and set the mirror aside. "You'd think this would be instinctual." 

"Coming on to yourself?" 

Dean gave an exasperated head jiggle, then gestured generally to his whole face. " _This._ We cut Abaddon into little bits and stitched her back together and she was looking as hot as ever right up until I killed her." 

Sam grimaced. "Does it creep you out when you talk now? Even a little?" 

"Nope." 

Sam opened the whiskey. 

"Maybe I shouldn't have killed Crowley so fast," Dean said. "Coulda made him teach me a few things, first." 

"Plus, there's the whole bit where you've created another power vacuum in Hell," Sam said. "Which has gone _so well_ for us historically." 

"Huh." Dean reached out and casually summoned one of the beers to himself without looking. Because alcoholic psychokinesis was totally instinctual, but not looking like a corpse wasn't. "Does that mean I'm in charge now?" 

"No," said Sam. 

"Nah, nah," Dean leaned back further, scraping the busted chair along the floor with his feet. "Just think about it. We could do it together, sort of a family bonding thing. You'd be a natural at it." He laughed. "Literally!" 

" _No,_ Dean." 

"Are you being grumpy because it would require you drinking my blood?" 

"I'm not 'being grumpy'. We're not ruling Hell together because you're not staying a demon." 

"Oh, so you can force feed me _your_ blood, but when I want to give you mine —" 

Sam didn't hear the rest of Dean's sentence. He was too busy storming out. 

Stupid fucking demon brother. Maybe he should just fucking exorcise him. See if that got the whole "being a demon is terrible" concept through his thick, dead skull.

*

Sam managed to ignore his brother for a good four hours — during which he really should have gotten some sleep, but, well. _Dean was a goddamn demon_ , so sleeping wasn't really a thing that Sam saw happening any time soon. Instead he dug back into the demon cure notes, reading up and making sure he still had all the steps down. Dean wasn't going to let up on him for a minute, even after Sam finally got him tied down and trapped, so Sam figured he'd better know the damn thing backwards and forwards. Crowley did a decent enough job getting under his skin and they'd only known each other a handful of years. Dean could potentially destroy him.

He was just getting the projector set up to review the video footage when the banging started up on the front door again. By the time he got back there, Dean had bashed several holes in the wall around it, and bent the iron railing into an S-curve. 

"Dude," Sam said. "It's _warded_. You're not getting through there." 

Dean spun. He'd made good progress on his mirror work — his skin was more of a grayish beige now, and his eyes only flashed black for a moment before resolving themselves back to their human state. "You gotta let me out of here, Sam. I'm goin' crazy." 

Sam dropped his chin, brows going up. "Yeah, there is no way that is happening." 

"Dude, come _on_. It's _stifling_ in here! I can feel all the wards choking me!" 

"That's because you're _evil_. If I let you out, you're going to go kill people. And then when I cure you, you're going to mope around and drink really heavily and probably cry. More than usual." 

Dean rolled his eyes like an exasperated teenager. "What if I promise to only kill _bad_ people?" 

"No."

"But —" 

" _No._ " 

"Sammy!" 

Dean was actually whining. If Sam hadn't already been sure, now he _knew_ he'd gone evil. He tipped his head, aiming what he knew was one of Dean's least favorite "bitch faces" at him, and smirked. " _Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus_. . . ."

Dean outright _shrieked._ "Dammit, Sam! Why you gotta be such an asshole about this?" 

"About you being a _demon?_ " Sam asked. He got another eye roll, complete with sagging shoulders, in response. 

"You say that like it's a _bad_ thing!" 

Sam wished he could resurrect Crowley, so he could chop off his head and burn it all over again.

*

"You're kidding me, right?"

Sam shrugged, holding the collar higher. "You want to go outside, this is how you're doing it." 

"You missed the whole part where I wanted to go outside to get _away_ from all the devil's traps and sigils and shit in here, didn't you." 

"Alright." Sam set the collar down on the table and went back to his books. "If that's how you feel. I'm not going to force you." 

He could feel Dean scowling. Literally. Dean was putting out some kind of demon scowling magic or something that seeped into the edges of Sam's brain like smoke. Or, you know, Sam was sleep deprived and hallucinating. One of the two. 

"No," Dean said. "You'll just keep me locked up in here." 

"I could always exorcise you." 

"You wouldn't dare." 

Sam shrugged again and tried to ignore the aura-of-scowl. After three minutes, Dean let out a groan of frustration, and the scowling stopped. After ten, he started pacing. 

A half an hour later, he wandered off. Sam heard him bang around in the kitchen for a bit, then move onto the dormitory area. Everything really dangerous was all locked up tight and warded, so while Sam continued to keep an ear out, he didn't worry too much it. 

He heard the garage door open and shut, then heard Dean howl. He looked up from the book and heard the door slam again and Dean's stomping footsteps coming back down the hall. 

"Forgot you warded the Impala too, huh?"

"I hate you," Dean said. Sam could feel the scowl building again. "Where's that fucking collar? Even convicts get time in the yard."

*

Looking after Dean as a demon was a lot like having a pet cat, Sam decided. Or it was at least like how the internet made having a pet cat seem. One of those creepy hairless ones that always looked pissed off. Dean's favorite activities were eating and pacing around the bunker. He'd developed a tendency to sneak up on Sam, suddenly appearing there, looming and staring when Sam happened to glance up from his research. When he wasn't wandering around the bunker, he was sitting as close to Sam as possible while studiously ignoring him — or demanding to be let outside.

The first time he went out, he paced back and forth along the verge, looking around and swinging his arms, while Sam stood by the door and watched. 

"What?" Dean asked. "Can't a guy get any exercise without supervision?" 

Sam shrugged. 

"I wasn't this much of a bitch to you when you were soulless," Dean said. 

"Yeah," Sam replied. "You kinda were." 

Dean harumphed and headed back to the door, standing there sullenly until Sam let him back in. 

The second time, Dean tried to convince Sam to play a game of pickup basketball with him. Without a hoop. 

Or a ball. 

"So we'll go into town and get the stuff," Dean said. "C'mon, Sammy, it'll be fun!" 

"Sure," Sam said. "After I cure you." 

"You're the worst." 

The third time, Dean just stood in the road, looking up at the night sky, his hands stuffed into his pockets. It was hot out, and the kind of humid that usually preceded a good sized storm, and Sam sweated through his undershirt in fifteen minutes. 

"Okay," he said. "Time to go back inside." 

"Nah," Dean said. "I'm good here." 

He looked it, too. Still too pale, but no longer obviously dead or inhuman, his skin dry and his eyes bright. He looked — he looked like Dean. Like the Dean Sam remembered from before all the crap started raining down on them hot and heavy. Before the angels and the apocalypse. Before Jake and Dean's deal hanging over their heads. 

From this angle, in this light, Dean looked like the person he'd been at his lightest, in those spare few weeks after they'd found Dad and before Meg started going after their friends. Energized. Cheerful. And so goddamn young. 

Sam had longed for this Dean for years. Of course it took the complete blackening of Dean's soul to get it. For Dean to let go of the guilt and finally be. . . . 

_Happy._

Sam couldn't see this. Not and keep his own shit together, keep moving forward and save his brother. "It's fucking gross out here, man," he said. "Knock when you want to come in." 

Dean was a demon, sure, but maybe he was still _Dean._ And he was right, they'd learned that demons were still capable of good things. Meg had proved that, finally, even if Ruby had just been out to manipulate him. Meg believed in living for a cause, and when her cause had been Cas, a good, if sometimes deeply misguided being, she did good — if sometimes deeply misguided — things. Dean lived for a cause, too. 

His cause was Sam. 

Not even demonhood could change that. 

Dean knocked on the door ten minutes later, and Sam stopped following him out when he got too restless indoors.

*

Then Dean went out and didn't come back. Sam found the collar on the road in front of the door, a bent up paperclip on top of it. The collar's sigils were all wards against demonic forces. Sam hadn't thought about the human ones Dean still had.

The curses spilling out of Sam's mouth would have impressed Dean, had he been there to hear them. He stormed his way back into the bunker, collar in hand, all the way to the storage room that housed the complex, permanent devil's trap. He'd trusted Dean, let him lull him into a false sense of security. 

He could not believe he'd fallen for it. 

He set up the summoning spell on the edge of the circle and nearly sliced through a tendon in his palm in his fury while casting it. Dean appeared immediately, black eyed and freaked, not yet practiced or powerful enough to evade the call. 

"Jesus, Sam, do you have any idea how much that sucks?!" 

Sam threw the collar at him, then stalked out without another word. Dean shouted at him from behind, but Sam couldn't even sense the scowl he knew his brother would be hurling his way. He heard Dean's steps stop abruptly at the edge of the trap, and Dean's shouts went up in pitch. 

Sam closed the shelves behind him, then locked the door to the storage room, crossed the hall and slammed his fist full force into the plaster. He drew back and did it again, and again and again, until he could no longer hear the shouts and pleas from inside the trap.

*

Honestly, when someone started knocking on the door an hour later, Sam was 100% sure it was Dean, somehow having made his way out of the layers of warding in the storage room dungeon _and_ the bunker at large, waiting for Sam to open up so he could gloat at him over another severed head.

When he opened the door and found Cas on the other side instead, looking like he should appear in the dictionary under the word "crestfallen", all Sam could really do was stare. 

"Sam," Cas said, and his tone would be filed directly under "stricken". Sam kept staring, taking in the dirt and sweat marks on his coat and the sagging skin beneath his eyes. 

"Cas," he said, finally. "You look like crap." 

Cas nodded. "My grace — the grace I stole — is fading. It took a very long time for me to get here." His brows came together and his eyes drifted off to the side. "I believe tradition states that I'm supposed to apologize and give you a hug." 

Sam blinked. "What?" 

Cas looked back at him, and Sam realized that "crestfallen" wasn't the word at all. Cas was _gutted_ , torn up in a way that Sam had never seen before. "Metatron told me. About — about Dean." 

"Oh." Sam knew he should be feeling something — sympathy pain in face of the naked hurt on Cas's face, if nothing else — but he'd reached a state of functional anesthesia, unable to feel more than a faint exhaustion in the back of his chest. "He's in the dungeon." 

Cas nodded slowly, eyes still beaten and aching, then frowned. "Wait, he's where?" 

"The dungeon," Sam said. "I didn't want to, but he tried to escape." 

Cas's eyes went sideways again and he frowned harder, mouth open. "Metatron told me Dean was _dead._ " 

"Oh." Right. That made sense. "Yeah, he was. Or — is. Or —" Sam cut himself off at the growing confusion and alarm on Cas's face. "Crowley made him a demon." 

Cas's expression went remarkably blank. His eyes were hard when they met Sam's again. "I see," he said, and he turned to go. Sam smirked tiredly, then managed to get the message to his hand — the one that wasn't currently bleeding from the knuckles and likely to start throbbing again at any moment — to stop him. 

"Crowley's already dead," he said, and Cas seemed to deflate. 

"Are you certain?" 

"Pretty much," Sam said. "First thing Dean did was hand me his head." 

"Ah." Cas nodded. "Good." 

Then he sagged into the door frame and sank to the floor in a dead faint.

*

"I'm sorry," Cas said, for what had to be the fifteenth time since he woke up — only moments after passing out in the door. "The loss of grace is . . . draining."

"Yeah," Sam said. "That's pretty much life." 

Cas sighed. "It never used to be." 

"Yeah? Lucky bastard." 

"I shouldn't think so, no." Cas shifted in his seat. "I don't understand, Sam. You have the supplies. You are well-versed in the process. Why have you not started to cure him yet?" 

The advantage of facing all this alone, Sam reflected, was not having to think too hard about questions like that one. 

"What if it doesn't work?" Sam asked, after staying quiet several moments too long. "What if it kills him?" 

"Then he will be no worse off than he was after Metatron," Cas said, his tone in some strange no man's land between "gentle" and "cold". "Dean would rather face death than be what he's become." 

That much was true. Sam understood that all too well. It was exactly what he'd been trying to explain to Dean all year: death was preferable. 

And what Sam felt right now, this great pressure of desperation filling his chest and rising up his throat, this was what Dean had been trying to explain to _him_. From this end, anything was better than death. 

"What about the Mark?" Sam asked. "It must have done something to him. People don't just _become_ demons like this." 

"It's extraordinarily rare," Cas agreed. "But not unprecedented. Cain himself was the first demon to be formed of Man. Abaddon, the Knights, even Azazel, they were all formed from angel grace, not human souls." 

"What if we cure him," Sam asked. "And the Mark just changes him back?" 

Cas looked at him, his head hanging heavy between his shoulders, and shook his head. "I don't know, Sam. There are no records in Heaven about the Mark beyond those already in your bible. The only one who may know for sure is Cain himself." 

"And the only one who knew where he was was Crowley." 

There was a knock on the door. 

"Are you expecting company?" Cas asked. 

Sam reached for his gun, shaking his head. 

"I'll stay here," Cas said after an aborted attempt to rise. "For back up." 

Sam cracked the door, leading with his gun, only to have an old sock with buttons stitched on it thrust into his face. He only barely managed not to shoot. 

"Well hi there, Sam!" the sock said, its voice high-pitched and patronizing. "How 'bout you tell your friend Mr. Fizzles what's wrong?" 

Sam wasted another bare moment staring at Mr. Fizzles, its plasticky button eyes gleaming and dead. Then he grabbed it by the — nose? upper lip? — and yanked, pulling the sock straight off the hand that animated it, and balling it up in his fist. The bare hand gaped at Sam, somehow managing to look appalled, then looked back at Garth through the gap in the door in a manner not unlike an exasperated man looking to the sky for explanation or assistance. 

Oh god. Sam was anthropomorphizing Garth's hand. 

"Jesus, Garth," he said, rubbing his eyes — with, he realized belatedly, Mr. Fizzles. "I almost shot you." 

Garth — and the skinned Mr. Fizzles — nodded sympathetically. "It's alright, Sam. I knew you were on edge." 

Sam didn't understand how that made nearly being shot even remotely alright. Even as a werewolf, getting shot had to fucking hurt. 

"I hear you've been having trouble accepting your brother's new status as a 'monster'." 

Sam shut his eyes, crumpling Mr. Fizzles harder in his hand and pumping his fist a few times as he searched for any way to answer that. Nope. There wasn't one. He stepped away from the door and started for the stairs back to the library. Judging by the footsteps and creak of the door, Garth was quick to follow. 

"I'm here to help you realize this is not the end of the world, Sam! I know you know that already, deep down in your heart, but after spending your lives hunting down anything that was outside the natural order, you still need time to adjust." 

"Dean's a demon, Garth." 

"See, now the first step is to decouple that term with your negative associations with it. Dean is still your brother, deep down, he still has that essential spark that makes him _Dean_ , and that won't change even now that he's —" The footsteps stopped. Sam turned to find Garth standing and blinking halfway down the stairs. "— did you say _demon?_ " 

"Yes," said Sam. 

"Ah," said Garth. He dug into his pocket, pulling out his cellphone. At least he wasn't still trying to react to everything through Mr. Fizzles. "Dean forgot to mention that part." 

Sam took the cellphone from him, ignoring Garth's "Hey, grabby!" Sure enough, there was a text message on the screen from Dean's phone number. 

_Sam gone crzy. locked up 4 being mnstr. send hlep._

"Fuck," Sam breathed, handing the phone back. "I didn't even think to check if he had his cellphone."

*

Dean lounged in the trap like he'd lounge on a bed, his legs stretched out in front of him, crossed at the ankle, his shoulders propped up on the trap's barrier, so he seemed to lean on the air itself. It was like he was practicing some sort of bizarre new core strengthening exercise. He had his phone in his hands, by the sound of it playing some mindless little flash game. He spared Sam a look as the door opened, then brightened and got to his feet when Garth stepped through.

Sam didn't give him time to speak. He marched up to the edge of the trap and flung the sock puppet down at Dean's feet. 

"Aw," Dean said. "Mr. Fizzles." 

"Who else did you contact?" Sam asked. 

"Hey, Garth," said Dean. 

"Dean." Garth sounded like he wasn't sure if he should be his bright, cheerful self, or glare Dean down the way Sam was doing. 

"Who else, Dean?" Sam demanded. Dean sighed. 

"You've had me locked up in here forever, Sam," he said. "Who else _didn't_ I contact?" 

As if on cue, Sam's phone buzzed. He looked down to see a text from Chrissy, Dean's girly mini-me buddy. 

_tell ur bro 2 stop txting_

_its weird_

"Yeah, well." Sam held up the phone, careful to keep it outside the trap. Dean came forward with a frown, having to come right up to the edge to read it. "You're alienating your fanbase." 

Dean shrugged. "She said she was on a stakeout. Figured she could use some entertainment." 

Sam wondered what his demon brother would consider entertaining that would prompt Chrissy to text him for help. Then he realized he probably really didn't' want to know. 

"Linda Tran's going to stop by, too," Dean said. "Turns out Cas got Heaven reopened, so Kevin's doing a farewell tour. No Jody, though. She doesn't want to leave Alex alone that long just yet." 

"That's too bad," Garth said. "I don't think _either_ of you should be totally alone right now." 

Dean grinned at him. "My man," he said, stretching his arms wide. "Let's hug it out." 

Sam put his own hand out, catching Garth in the chest. "Don't." 

"Well _duh_." Garth shoved Sam's hand away, and if Sam were willing to look away from Dean just now, he was sure he'd see Garth glaring at him. 

Dean shrugged and dropped his arms. "Worth a shot. Hey, you think the old Em Oh El had a way of communicating with Oz down here? I'd love to see Charlie one last time, too. Before you off me." 

"We're not here to kill you, Dean," Garth said. 

"Oh no?" Dean tilted his head. "Has Sam filled you in yet? See, he's got this whole 'cure the demon' thing cooked up, but I'm pretty sure he's forgetting something." 

Sam shook his head. "I've been over the details, Dean. I'm going to make sure I have everythi —" He cut himself off as all the healthy color drained from Dean's face, leaving his skin dark gray and mottled. Dean poked at his chest, pushing part of his t-shirt into a hole that just shouldn't be there. 

"Demons don't heal their host bodies, Sam," Dean said. "Remember Meg? Fell apart from the inside out. This body is dead." He looked up and a wash of pink rushed back through him until he once again looked normal — as normal as the situation allowed, anyway. "You cure me and you'll be killing us both." 

"Now hang on just a moment," Garth said. "Since when is there a cure for being a demon?" 

"Since the fifties at least," Dean said. He started pacing across the trap. "Men of Letters worked it out. It ain't exactly the walk in the park that the vampire cure is, either." 

". . . You can cure vampires?" 

Sam sighed. "Old Campbell recipe." 

"Like tomato soup?" 

"You know," Dean said. "We really probably should have spread the word on those. Even just a little." He smirked at Sam and then his gaze shifted behind him, eyes lighting up in a way that was just so _Dean_ that for a moment even Sam wanted to let him go. "Cas." 

Sam turned his head and saw the angel leaning his weight against a shelf and staring back. "Dean," he said. "I hoped never to see you like this." 

Dean shrugged. "It's not so bad. Beats bleeding out in Metatron's fucking homeless ministry." 

"No. It really doesn't." Cas looked at Sam. "You have visitors." 

Mrs. Tran stepped out around Cas, her arms folded over her chest as though she were trying to hold something in. "Sam," she said, and looked past him. "Dean." 

Dean smiled gently. "Linda. Is Kevin still here?" 

She nodded. Kevin flickered into view next to her. 

"Good," Dean said, and suddenly he was levelling a gun at her head. "'Cause he's going to break the trap. Or I'm going to blow your brains out." 

Everyone started yelling at once. The trap room wasn't built to hold this many people — even without avoiding the trap itself, the place would've been cramped. Voices bounced off the concrete wall and floor, pounding straight into the spot behind Sam's eyes. He could suddenly feel the exhaustion he'd been pushing off since the moment Dean woke him up with Crowley's head and every ache pounding through his body, starting with the hand he'd used to beat the wall. It was all going to Hell. Dean was going to drag each and every one of them down with him, and it was all Sam's fault. 

Demons didn't use guns. Hell, most of them were born and died well before the western world figured out how to get them to do more than hit the broad side of a barn. Ruby had been weird enough just for using a knife. You didn't disarm a demon before you put him in a trap, the trap _was_ the disarmament. Unless the demon was Dean fucking Winchester, who didn't go anywhere without at least three weapons on him at all time. A trap wouldn't do a goddamn thing to stop a bullet, no matter who was pulling the trigger. Jesus, Sam hadn't even bothered to tie Dean up. He'd just summoned him in and left him there, even after seeing what Dean had accomplished with that collar. 

Crowley might have maneuvered Dean into position, but Sam was the one who unleashed him on the world. 

Somehow, it was Mrs. Tran who moved first. 

Sam didn't even have a chance to stop her. Didn't have the reaction time to stop her. Fuck, why hadn't he taken a fucking nap? She ducked under the range of the gun and was inside Dean's reach before Sam had even processed that she was moving. She grabbed Dean's wrist with one hand and brought the other down sharply on Dean's forearm. Dean flinched — probably more from instinct than actual pain, Sam thought, though he imagined he could hear the bones in Dean's arm breaking — and let go of the gun. Garth reached into the trap to grab it as Mrs. Tran forced Dean back, marching him across the room until she ran him right up against the far side of the circle. Dean's eyes went full black. Mrs. Tran hissed in his face. 

"Do you think I can't take you, old woman?" Dean grabbed both her wrists, showing his teeth like an animal. 

"Do you think that I care?" asked Mrs. Tran. "My son is dead. He was the only thing I had left in this world. I don't want to die, but I'm willing, if I have to." 

"Mom!" Kevin had vanished somewhere in the confusion and he appeared now at her side. "No!" 

"Heya, Kev," Dean said, still flashing that wide eyed, angry grin. "How's the afterlife treating you?" 

"It fucking sucks," Kevin said. "You kill my mom and I will destroy you." 

And then Cas was pushing past Sam and striding across the trap like he hadn't been struggling to hold himself up just a few moments before. "I'm sorry, Dean," he said, and his hand clapped down over Dean's forehead and they both sagged to the floor like their bones had been replaced with sawdust, nearly taking Mrs. Tran down with them. Kevin caught her just in time, and Cas knelt over Dean, gasping and swaying. Garth stood at the trap's edge, Dean's gun in one hand, the magazine in the other. 

They all looked back at Sam: angel, spirit, hunter, and mother, a demon unconscious at their feet, and Sam realized he'd never felt so completely useless in his entire life.

*

"I can heal his body," Cas offered, as Sam and Garth lifted Dean onto the cot they'd dragged into the dungeon. Sam turned his head to give him a look and Cas blanched. "I can . . . try to heal his body."

Sam sighed, locking a cuff around Dean's ankle and following the chain to the next cuff. "Knocking him out almost put you down, Cas." 

"It would put a strain on the remainder of my stolen grace," Cas admitted. "But I can think of little better use for it." 

"Never did have much of an imagination," Dean said, and Sam and Garth both jumped back. Dean lifted his head and tugged at the restraints — all but his left ankle was now chained securely to the cot. "This really necessary?" 

"You tried to shoot Mrs. Tran," Garth said. 

Dean dropped his head back down. "Oh yeah. Sorry. Seemed like a good idea at the time." 

"Jesus, Dean," Sam breathed, checking over his shoulder to make sure that Mrs. Tran, who'd decided to vacate the dungeon at Kevin's assistance, didn't hear. 

"I was kidding, Sam," Dean said, and Sam turned to look back at him. Dean shrugged, managing to appear almost sheepish. "You know, mostly." He lifted his right arm as far as he could — which wasn't very, Garth had chained it down tight to the cot — and rattled the cuff a little. "These things fucking _itch_." The rest of his breath slid out through his teeth as he pulled with both arms, then slumped again with a faint gasp. "Seriously, dude. Can we maybe _not?_ " 

"It's for your own good, Dean," Garth said. 

"I didn't do anything." 

"You killed Crowley." Cas hung back, Sam noticed, like he was afraid to walk too close, even with Dean restrained. 

"And that's a bad thing?" Dean asked. "He's been fucking us over for years!" 

"You handed me his head," Sam said. "It was still bleeding." 

"So, what, I should have put it on a platter?" Dean asked, lifting his head to stare at Sam. "Like you asked for with Lilith?" 

Huh. Sam blinked. He had said something like that, hadn't he. 

Dean smiled. "Uh huh, see, you can't tell me you haven't thought about it, Sammy." 

Sam shook his head sharply. "Thinking isn't the same as doing, Dean." 

"Okay, fine." Dean lifted both hands in a very restricted shrug. "So it was a little over the top. He was a bad guy. He was in the process of doing bad things. I mean, hell, Sam, _he turned me into a demon_. If that's not the time to kill a guy, what is?" 

Sam should've had an answer to that. He was sure of it. But the fact was, they killed evil things all the time, usually without blinking or flinching. Was what Dean had done really that bad?

Dean brightened, clearly reading Sam's train of thought on his face. Sam pressed his hand over his eyes; he couldn't look at Dean and stay objective at the same time. 

"You tried to leave," he said finally. He imagined Garth and Cas stepping back, exchanging looks across Dean's prone form. He wished they'd leave. This was between Sam and Dean. Anyone else was just intruding. "Fuck. You _did_ leave." 

"You tried to exorcise me," Dean said softly. "This is my body, Sam. Where else am I supposed to go?" 

Sam swallowed and turned his head away, still unable to look his brother in the face. 

"We'll be back later," he said, staring down Garth when he looked like he was going to protest. Cas hesitated at Dean's side, then slid his hands into his pockets and moved to follow. Sam led the way out of the dungeon and slowly closed the doors behind him. He expected Dean to start shouting again, or at least for him to rattle his chains, jerk against them like he was going to follow. 

But all Dean did was turn his head and watch him until the doors locked into place between them.

*

"He has a point," Cas said. He sat slumped at the library table again, where they'd all gathered after they left Dean behind. "He hasn't done anything especially strange or evil yet."

"He tried to kill my mom." Kevin's shape shuddered and blurred at the edges. Sam half expected him to turn red like an angry cartoon character, or start snarling. 

"No," Mrs. Tran said. "I don't think he did." 

"Mom —" 

She held up her hand and gave Kevin a stern look. "I know what it looks like when someone wants to hurt me, Kevin. I've known it for a very long time." 

"He held a gun on you!" 

"He wasn't going to shoot it," Mrs. Tran said. She looked at Sam. "You couldn't see that?" 

Sam shook his head. "Demons lie, Mrs. Tran. It's basically their first instinct." 

"They're also very fast," Mrs. Tran said. "If he wanted to shoot me, he could have."

Kevin let out a frustrated growl and vanished. Mrs. Tran shut her eyes. 

"He's always so angry, now," she said. "He used to be such a sweet little boy." 

Garth shifted his chair closer to her, holding out his hand. "That's what happens, ma'am," he said. "They don't mean to, but folks stick around too long, they can't help it." 

Mrs. Tran looked at him and nodded, taking his hand and giving it a squeeze. "The same thing happened to my father before he died. He was lost and so afraid. He lashed out." She looked back at Sam, her eyes going hard. "That's what's happening to your brother, too." 

"He's a _demon_ ," Sam said. 

"He is _terrified_ ," said Mrs. Tran. 

Sam wished he could disappear with a frustrated huff, too. 

"Sam," Cas said. "Does Dean still have his tattoo?" 

Sam frowned and shrugged. "Yeah, I think so. Why?" 

Garth perked up. "His anti-possession tattoo?" 

"He's not _possessed_ ," Sam said. "He can't be." Sam couldn't even dare to hope for that. 

"No," Cas said. "He's alone in his body, I've enough grace left to be sure of that. But he's not secure there. I've never occupied an unwilling form, but I imagine it would be uncomfortable." 

"Itchy," Garth said. 

"To say the least." 

Sam looked between the two of them. He could feel the exhaustion welling up again, slowing him down. Keeping him sloppy. "You're saying we should break the tattoo." 

"What Dean is now has very little precedent," Cas said. "There's no telling what an anti-demon sigil on his body could be doing to him now." 

Sam pressed his fingers against the bridge of his nose. "I don't know, guys. I just —" 

Dean screamed.

*

Sam couldn't for the life of him figure out how, but Garth managed to get back to the dungeon first. He threw open the doors and charged right through like the world's scrawniest linebacker, and Sam resisted the urge to grab him by the back of the collar and hold him off. Dean was tricky. Demons were even more so. There was approximately a 97.5% chance that this was a ruse.

Or, you know, it could be an angry spirit exacting revenge on the guy who held a gun on his mom half an hour ago. That was a possibility, too. 

Dean was still locked to the cot, his one free leg flailing and kicking at the air as he snarled at Kevin. Who was straddling him on the cot, both his hands wrapped around the hilt of Ruby's old demon-killing knife, which he had apparently managed to bury a few inches deep into the bony part of Dean's shoulder. Sparks lit the whole joint from within every time the knife jostled, occasionally reaching as far as Dean's elbow and jaw. It was a tiny storm of chaos inside the trap, with Dean arching up on the cot and thrashing and Kevin growling back, his face screwed into a charred grimace, his eyes burnt-out sockets. Sam glanced behind him, hoping Mrs. Tran hadn't followed. 

Yeah, his luck really wasn't that good right now. 

Garth pulled up short a few feet from the cot, hands out like he was getting ready to catch something. "Alright, guys," he said. "Now we can work this out." 

"Kevin," Mrs. Tran called. "You get down off of there this instant!" 

Sam closed his eyes, wondering if maybe when he opened them, the whole situation would have worked itself out. Or maybe that he would have rewound the world by a week, and Dean would still be alive and not evil. 

While he was at it, maybe he could keep going. All the way back to Stanford and the last time he'd been really, truly happy. He could open his eyes and find Jess smiling at him and then he'd pick up the phone and call Dean just because, and they'd skip this whole fucking mess that was their lives. 

Dean screamed again. Sam stepped back into the storage room, grabbed a shotgun and some ammo, and stepped back in just far enough to shoot Kevin full of rock salt. 

Because fuck his life. Seriously. 

Dean collapsed back flat against the cot, his chest heaving. The knife stuck straight out from his shoulder, still sending small sparks through his skin. His eyes were cold, glossy black even in the dim light of the dungeon, but Sam could still see the pain at the bottom of them. He realized he'd actually been seeing it there, all along. As a demon Dean was deeply wounded, even more so than he'd ever been human. 

"What'd you do that for?" Dean asked, staring at the ceiling. 

Sam slowly lowered the gun. "He was trying to kill you." 

Dean turned his head, and Sam watched the black bleed from his eyes. "Why'd you stop him?" 

Sam refused to even dignify that with an answer. 

Garth stepped up and grabbed the knife. He pulled and Dean arched again, swallowing another cry of pain. Garth frowned and wrapped both hands around the knife's hilt. It didn't budge. 

"Damn," he said. "This sucker is in here _tight_." 

"Yeah," Dean hissed through clenched teeth. "Kevin was trying to pull it back out." He glanced at Mrs. Tran at that, and she nodded once, one arm wrapped over her stomach, her opposite hand pressed to her chest. 

"He'll be back, won't he?" she asked. "You didn't —" 

"Any minute now," Sam said. "The salt just . . . dispersed him." 

"Does it hurt?" 

Sam looked away. 

Dean screamed again as Garth finally worked the knife loose. "Seriously," he whispered. "You can end it. I won't mind." 

Sam was pretty sure he wasn't supposed to have heard him. "Dean," he said. "We can still fix this." 

Dean shut his eyes. Sam wasn't sure he'd ever seen a demon cry, before, not real tears — but if any had the ability, it'd be Dean. He always did that hard-frown, single tear thing. When Sam cried, his whole face fell apart. Dean just looked even more stoic than ever. 

And fuck, now Sam was jealous of his dead, demonic brother's ability to cry with dignity. 

"We can't," Dean said. "I'm not Locutus of Borg, Sam. There's no brave captain in here fighting to get back out. It's just me and I can't — I don't even fit in my own skin —" 

"The tattoo," Sam said. "Cas thinks it's affecting you, even though you're not really possessing yourself." 

Dean swallowed, his hands twitching in the restraints. "It's not the tattoo. It's everything, man. It's the bunker and the cold and — and the way you fucking look at me. Like I'm some slimy thing that stole your brother. Like I'm a cheap replacement." 

Sam wished he could deny that. He shoved his hands in his pockets, turning his eyes to the floor. 

"Oh that's bullshit." Sam's head shot up, and he stared at Mrs. Tran. She was standing by Dean's head, now, her arms folded over her chest, glaring down at him. Dean grimaced. 

"I tried to shoot you, Linda." 

"If you had wanted to shoot me, I would be dead." She leaned down and unlocked the cuff around Dean's right wrist. Sam's eyes went wide and he patted his pockets. 

"Where — how did you —" 

"I stole it." Mrs. Tran — Linda — shot Sam a look that stopped him in his tracks, then moved on to Dean's left wrist. Dean sat up slowly, rubbing his wrists, and she handed him the key to unlock his own ankle. "You thought you wanted to die," she said. "But you didn't want to make Sam responsible. So you brought us here to kill you instead."

"Kevin changed his mind," Dean said. "He wouldn't do it." 

Linda nodded. "Kevin is a good boy — a good _man_. Becoming a spirit hasn't changed that." 

"It will," Dean said darkly. "You don't understand." 

Garth raised his hand. "I do." He flashed a bemused little smile and wiggled his fingers. "Werewolf. You'd think that'd change me, but it hasn't, not deep down." 

"You were supposed to keep Sam distracted," Dean said. 

"I don't think so." Garth walked over to the cot and sat down next to Dean, close enough to touch shoulders. Dean tried to rear away, only to run into Linda, who still glared down at him. "I think I'm here to help you with the transition." 

"Guys," Sam tried. They ignored him. 

"Do you remember what Captain Picard's older brother told him, in the episode after he was Locutus of Borg?" Linda asked. 

"We watch a lot of Netflix." Sam startled. Kevin had reformed directly beside him. "Also, that salt thing fucking sucks, jackass." 

"Yeah," Sam said. "Sorry." 

Dean was still trying to inch his way out from between the two friends he himself had conned into coming to help him. Neither Garth nor Linda was letting him go, though. 

"Robert Picard," Linda said. "Wine maker, and big brother to one of the most famous, admired captains of Starfleet. When he learned what the Borg put Jean-Luc through, do you remember what he said?" She glanced over her shoulder at Sam, then looked back at Dean. "'Live with it.'"

*

They removed the anti-possession tattoo.

Castiel's juice was running too low for him to just miracle it off, so they had to do it the old fashioned way. Dean did the honors himself, pressing the flat of a heated knife against his chest, because Dean needed to be a badass in everything he did and fuck if Sam wasn't now feeling jealous of his brother for _burning a hole in his own chest_. 

There wasn't much they could do about the bunker. Even with Abaddon and Crowley out of the way — maybe even especially with them gone — they couldn't risk opening the place up to demonic attack. Hell was lacking a leader again, and Dean wasn't even remotely interested in the job. They did clean up the Impala, though, so Dean could still drive it when he got sick of teleporting himself around as soon as he stepped outside. 

Dean was an even bigger pain in the ass as a demon than he ever was human, though so far, Garth and Linda were right. There was an extra edge of crazy there, but Dean wasn't really very evil. Late at night, when he was sure no one else was listening, Dean would confess that it was partially having Sam around that did it. "You know," he said. "Like when you were soulless and I had to be your conscience." 

"So you're saying you're not evil, you're just amoral." 

"Chaotic neutral." Dean grinned, eyes flashing black. 

"That's fucking creepy," Sam said. "Don't make me get out the holy water." 

"Yeah, yeah." Dean shoved Sam off his chair without moving a muscle. Sam pulled out his little plastic squirt gun and sprayed a few drops onto Dean's hand. 

"No, Dean. Bad." 

Dean hissed, shaking out his hand. He was going to sulk the whole ride home, Sam just knew it. 

Jerk.


End file.
